[Samba] SWAT Won't Start - Alarm Clock

[Michael Heydon]

Bit wrote:
> Ryan Novosielski wrote:
> <snip>
> I didn't think this would really matter though.  This raises other 
> questions for me.
>
> 1)  I don't get it.  Why does swat have to be launched via xinetd?
Probably to keep it simple, no need to worry about creating listening 
ports, spawning worker threads, thinking about timeouts, etc.
>
> 2)  I've never used xinetd much, but I always imagined it working as a 
> wrapper around any normal client/server architecture-based service.  
> Is that not the right way to think about it?  Do you have to make a 
> conscious choice to code your program appropriately to be launched via 
> xinetd?
Alot of programs that can be run from inetd can also be run stand alone 
(ftp, samba, telnet, etc) however it is not a requirement. The process 
for running via inetd and stand alone is different, your program needs 
to be coded with one or the other, or both (along with a way for it to 
tell which it should use).

Personally, I don't see the value in inetd anymore. It used to be 
useful, if you had a small server that wasn't doing much and had limited 
resources then you didn't have to have your telnet and ftp and 
everything else services running when they weren't in use. These days 
when the average small server has over 1GB of RAM there really isn't 
much to be gained by not running stand alone. I haven't had inetd 
running for quite a few years.
>
> Thanks again,
> bit
>


*Michael Heydon - IT Administrator *
michaelh at jaswin.com.au <mailto:michaelh at jaswin.com.au>